You can still recoup your cost for the Timehouse Convoy on eBay (I did recently)--you just won't be making scalper money on it. As for Rodimus, I had the Metalverse Rodimus vinyl statue, which still is the most beautiful physical rendition of the character ever, but I ditched it a couple of months ago knowing that the transforming version was coming out. Just in time.

I still prefer the look of Timehouse's Convoy over that of the Masterpiece. That it was made of hollow vinyl didn't bother me that much. Too bad it didn't transform.

Eh, looks like the character to me. I'm becoming less and less fond of fiddly toys myself, yet this does look really nice to me. I really wish that they had produced MP Prime and Megatron in scale with this and Grimlock. Yes, I know they came first, but they're just too damn big.

I really wish that they had produced MP Prime and Megatron in scale with this and Grimlock. Yes, I know they came first, but they're just too damn big.

I agree...but the opposite way. The new ones are too small. I noticed what's wrong with the head sculpts of the figure and how they pulled off the Hot Rod to Rodimus transformation.

I think as far as the transformation goes. He gains extra height at the top of the theigh and I figure the face rotates like it does with Starscream.

What's wrong with the faces? I would have said nothing if Takara hadn't showed close ups of the figures. Hot rod's face is too thin and the lines on Roddimus Prime cheek should extend to the bottom of the nose as on the photo. As it stands doesn't it look like Roddimus face looks like the Jesus face on the Shroud of Turin?

I thought Yamato was the only one notorious for fiddly transformations, not Takara Tomy. I'm glad that Hot Rod doesn't have the clown face lines on the figure sculp. Maybe they could have given Hot Rod a smile to add to his youth.

Personally, I've never been a fan of Rodimus' face--even in the movie. The vertical lines that chisel his cheeks are 'missing', but I don't know if it'd improve the mature look. But it's a vast improvement from the G1 toy...besides, I'm not looking at it with a magnifying glass.

This figure looks awesome, a dream come true for me! I just received TFX-Crossfire 2 today, but I guess I should hop on the bandwagon and preorder this MP too...

It is a true credit to the designers of Hot Rodimus that the only gripe we can come up with is that the lines on the cheek.This figure has stirred my Masterpiece blood.

I'm now thinking about getting the weakest design of the series "Megatron" and the riffle upgrade. I was really hoping for a Cartoon accurate figure even at the sacrifice of the gun mode looking realistic. It looks like a bigger version or the original crappy figure.The figure is still common on Ebay but is there someplace still selling the upgrade?...now I got to get the Starscream crown...damn here I go again!

Heh, I really like Rodimus Prime. I just wish they could have found a way for all his parts to connect into his trailer mode, but then pretty much no other Transformer could do the same either at the time. G1 Megatron was pretty damn floppy, and not a whole lot of fun to play with. He looks nice on my shelf, and as a neat bit of nostalgia, but he's definitely not one I get out and play with. Rodimus, however, comes off his shelf every few months.

I never had a G1 Megatron, though I always wanted one. Now, to me, I'm more interested in it as a Microman design (and my HC/Microman/Diaclone fandom is completely separate in my head from my TF fandom)...and many vintage Microman designs are floppy by our standards.

But I guess my point is that "crappy" Megatron was just about the most popular fucking thing on planet Earth when it came out. I'm pretty sure that, at the time, it beat out Jesus and sugar. Every boy I knew wanted one...and that Christmas, most of us got Optimus Primes instead! ;P

Original Meg did suck as a toy. A lot of TF did at the time but to be the main bad guy yes he sucked. Sanjeev You have always mentioned how much you hate floppy figitty figures and G1 Meg was the poster chield of that. Original skids was probably the next and worst made of the lot. I was told that Starscream was suppose to be the original main bad guy which explains why his colors aped OP. (The best and worst of the red white and blue!) OP couldn't hold his riffle correctly and the plug in hands were a pain but OP was still a cool original figure. I think Meg got popular once the character was developed as a good villian on TV.

P.S. What was that silver piece that came with original Meg used for. I never could figure what it was used for.

A lot of the early TFs that derive from Microchange/Diaclone toys back then were pretty fragile. Perhaps not "floppy" per se, but definitely prone to break, or had shit that was easy to lose. [The seekers were pretty solid...but even they had tons of bits that could separate and get lost.]

When I complain about "floppy", I often refer to toys that have three hundred joints to make a wing turn into a foot...and the result being a mess that can barely hold either form. I just don't remember Megatron being *that* bad (only one kid on my block had one...and I remember thinking it was okay). But who knows...maybe you're right: I'll have to check one out and see.

But I'm also someone who loves Diaclone stuff. Have you ever handled a Walk Insector? They're like fucking jewels. Little wind-up jewels of pure awesome. But they don't come more delicate than that! Suffice it to say, if I got a Megatron, I'd play with it as a Microchange toy with other such delicate (or even floppy) Microman stuff...not really as a Transformer.

Sanjeev Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> When I complain about "floppy", I often refer to
> toys that have three hundred joints to make a wing
> turn into a foot...and the result being a mess
> that can barely hold either form. I just don't
> remember Megatron being *that* bad (only one kid
> on my block had one...and I remember thinking it
> was okay). But who knows...maybe you're right:
> I'll have to check one out and see.

It's mainly the hips, though the pull out legs sometimes had a bit of a hard time holding the toy's weight without collapsing. Pretty much depends on how much you transformed him.

>
> But I'm also someone who loves Diaclone stuff.
> Have you ever handled a Walk Insector? They're
> like fucking jewels. Little wind-up jewels of pure
> awesome. But they don't come more delicate than
> that! Suffice it to say, if I got a Megatron, I'd
> play with it as a Microchange toy with other such
> delicate (or even floppy) Microman stuff...not
> really as a Transformer.
>
> Oh...and were you referring to Megatron's gun?
> [www.seibertron.com]
> egatron064.jpg
> I'm guessing the US Megatron release never
> included that, but it was part of the Microchange
> release.

No, Megs had the smaller gun. What he didn't have was the sword, or the bullets or firing mechanisms. Luckily, the Transformers Collection release of Megs DID have all that stuff. Even had a purple energy mace as seen in the cartoon as well. It's a nice release if you're looking for a version of him.

I NEVER knew that was a gun...after all those years I learned something. I guess to be a gun and having a partical beam cannon for a gun on his arm that combined with the stock and silencer to make another gun his. It nrver dawned on me that he neededanother gun.

as far as G1 meg goes:

The head never sat on the body well.
The hip joints managed to be squeaky AND floppy at the same time.
The arms were too short and had no articulation.
He couldn't hold the gun on his arm without falling over or arm dropping (like the gun on the Ultra Magnus fansproject.)
the color of the gun barrel was WAY off comparred to the rest of the figure.

Sanjeev If I were you I'd go for the bullet shooting, black version. If you are going to get it as a microman line toy and HAVE to deal with the floppyness you might as well go with the rare bells & whistle version.

I was a big micronaut/man fan because of all the articulation the figures had.

I always wanted to start collecting ZOIDS.

But there have been so many different versions. Something about building a monster and watching it move. If there are any ZOID lovers out there stop me by telling me what I'm getting into.

For the record, neither my Microman Microchange P-38 UNCLE nor my Encore Megatron have floppy hips, but it's definitely a weird hip design. The head locks perfectly on the chest on both of those. Now, I used to have the original D-16S reissue of Megatron from like 2001 or 2002 and that reissue had some problem with the chest that made it not want to open all the way and therefore the head had trouble connecting, but that was a reissue problem that was fixed for the Encore line as far as I can tell.

One thing that bugs me though is that the mounting point on the arm so the scope can connect as a cannon limits the articulation of the arm. You have to be careful that you don't clip the side of the robot's chest when raising and lowering the arm due to that mounting point. The black Microman regular P-38 without the scope/stock/silencer doesn't have this issue.

One of my favorite things about the UNCLE/Megatron is that the scope/stock/silencer combine into a sweet gun emplacement that the robot OR a Microman can use. If you have the black regular P-38, put that in robot mode manning the gun emplacement and it looks super sweet.

I really like Megatron a lot, but there's some awkwardness to it, as there are with many Diaclone Car Robot and Microman Microchange designs.

The Browning Gunrobo design is probably technically better and the robot mode is much less weird, but it doesn't have so many bells and whistles and is a lot smaller and less impressive. I guess you could argue that with Megatron they were trying to do something more complicated and taking more risks and in some ways that was a detriment? I still like Megatron, though, even if his robot mode is kind of tubby.

I dunno--his arm seems to be able to support that scope/cannon pretty well. But I'm sure if you play with it a ton, it'll loosen up. But...isn't that true of ALL toys? Anyway, some of my favorite TF designs have short arms with little to no articulation, so I'm not worried about that either.

Ginrai just broke down for me all the shit he does (like the secondary firing mechanism in the stock that can attach to the back of the robot to shoot from the pistol barrel in the hip).

I vaguely remember the hips being a little loose on my buddy's Megatron, but even without the firing mechanism, all this badass shit he could do was pretty fly. The gun emplacement combos on the right are fucking cool!

Anyway, it seems far from perfect, but I'm still thinking it's far from crappy.

I love G1 Megatron. I managed to snag a nice condition stickerless pre-rub version for dirt a few years back, and even after being played with, he's rock solid. He's a bit awkwardly designed, but I think some of those awkward choices make him both better looking and more fun to play with. I've been keeping my eye out for no chrome blue-legs shooting JP G1 version (later dubbed Megaplex in the reissue line). The Microchange version will have to wait.

Eh, I have a KO Browning that is pretty old itself, and I wasn't all that impressed with it. Yeah, it's missing the nice chrome that the real one has, but it's got the metal. It's got less of the giant crotch that Megatron has, but the toy is just fairly unremarkable. It's solid, but completely unspectacular. Megatron's got all those gimmicks, and he's asymmetrical in a good way (unlike many later asymmetrical TF toys that were lamely deliberate in the designer's attempt to be "different"). And he's just a classic design that will draw the eye. Megatron's a lot more solid in his gun mode too, though I suppose that a real version of Browning might be tighter.

Mine wasfloppy in the arm department but tight in the legs. I was pretty creative with making different guns and weapons with my microman but i never thought to do that with megs back in the day. I was wondering WHAT really bothered me about the figure more than anything else and I thought it was the little arms. NO! t was that HUGE raging boner the robot looked like he had all the time...and that is where I had to put my finger! I could relate being 13 at the time but still. For me the robot mode sells me especially when the perportions are correct which iswhy I liked Soundwave and mever turned him into a cassette player.

I had Megatron as a kid, but no Op. Never was able to figure out how to transform him properly- I remember being blown away when seeing all of the alternate gun configurations (above) as an adult while browsing the Microman websites.

Speaking of Microman guns... I've wanted the S&W Magnum 44 in the worst way for quite a while. A transforming revolver?? Come on. That's all kinds of awesome. Sometimes I toy with the notion of bidding on one, but apprehensions about customs ripping through my box and seizing the toy always stop me. Still thinking about that one.

> Speaking of Microman guns... I've wanted the S&W
> Magnum 44 in the worst way for quite a while. A
> transforming revolver?? Come on. That's all
> kinds of awesome. Sometimes I toy with the notion
> of bidding on one, but apprehensions about customs
> ripping through my box and seizing the toy always
> stop me. Still thinking about that one.